Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

RANT MODE ON
I used to be a regular 40K player, starting right when 5th came out. Usually every other Friday (I'm married with 3 kids) I'd get to go play at my FLGS. There was a diverse crowd with everything from uber commpetative to super fluffy players. I would get a couple of friendly games in, enough to scratch my itch, and be good until next time. About a year ago I left the military after 15 years due to injury and came home. I have not played a game since. There is only 1 local store that has a 40K group, but I do not find it a friendly enviroment. Triple Ripetide/WS spam/power flavor of the month are the only type of lists played. I enjoy and miss the more laid back games. I play SoB, so I have no counter to many of these power lists. The Tau players at my old store discussed in depth how SoB could counter Ripetides, and they decided that there was no way for them to deal with triple tides. I do not want to have to ally in just to have a chance at a draw. I have talked to the players about smaller friendly games but the idea was regected. Had one player actual comment "I can't fit all 3 riptides in a smaller game, so no". They next closest store to play at is alomst 2 hours away. I miss playing. I do not care if I win or lose as long as long as I had a fun time playing. But when there is little chance for even a semi fun game, why bother.....

QUESTION
How do other people cope when they're LGS is not a fun place to play? If you know there is little to no chance for anything other then a stomping, how do you not give up on the game?

Find friends to introduce to the game and relearn everything with them and then see if they have friends who'd like to learn?

It blows my mind how often people do not practice what they preach. We hear online how much people will do anything to incorporate a game, and then someone comes along and says they can't find a game like this. It's revolting.


To cope? Ask and see if there's an online forum these guys attend. Chances are there's other people in your area who are in a similar boat as you. They probably don't go to the game store because it's swarmed by such a hyper-competitive crew. If you can start communicating with the, you should be able to find it pretty easy to start getting some fun games in!

Same way all whfb player dealt with it. Cry become depressed, sell of all models but the ones you like the most and wait a couple months to see what changed.

SoB are basically gone and a thing of the past.

People got new and very pricey models and like to use them. If you spent 400$ on riptides then someone says dont bring them well you will say naw I will find someone else to play with.

So again I guess wait out a couple months and see what happens or move on or buy more stuff.

The store near me that has 40k on Thursdays has laid back, fun people. You also have some that will ask if you want competitive or laid back, and will gladly dial up or down their list accordingly.

The problem? Not enough table space. Thursday is also board game night, and 1/2 to 2/3 of the tables are filled with board gamers and RPGers. That leaves 2-3 tables for 40k, so we have to play 2x2 or 2x3 games.

For some reason, even though it is like this EVERY fething week, and even though EVERYONE knows that you either bring 1000 or 1500 points for 2x2 or 2x3 games, no one fething makes lists.

It takes 2 hours to get gak sorted.

2 people with 1500 points get to bring more toys than the 3 people with 1000 points, after each pay their troop taxes.

It's loud with the RPGers and board gamers (not knocking them. It's just too many people)

Games take until midnight, and i have an hour drive home and work on Fridays. Also, 1/2 the time, I travel home on Thursdays, so heading to the game store is daunting those weeks.

Anyhow, for now, I just play board games and sign up for tournaments, now. That's all I have time for.

OgreChubbs wrote:
Same way all whfb player dealt with it. Cry become depressed, sell of all models but the ones you like the most and wait a couple months to see what changed.

SoB are basically gone and a thing of the past.

People got new and very pricey models and like to use them. If you spent 400$ on riptides then someone says dont bring them well you will say naw I will find someone else to play with.

So again I guess wait out a couple months and see what happens or move on or buy more stuff.

The frustrating thing is that until this edition, SoB were still a very playable army. What kept them scarse was the cost of buying the models. GW has stated in the past that they will not get rid of SoB, but that does not mean they won't ignore them either. Things like unbound and super heavys have made most TAC lists null and void. You have to bring a super or a way to deal with one. SoB lack both.

And yes if people have the right to field models if they bought them, but if you spend $400 on ripetides, I feel it says something about you as a player that you felt like to needed that many in one game in the first place.

 Salted Diamond wrote:

OgreChubbs wrote:
Same way all whfb player dealt with it. Cry become depressed, sell of all models but the ones you like the most and wait a couple months to see what changed.

SoB are basically gone and a thing of the past.

People got new and very pricey models and like to use them. If you spent 400$ on riptides then someone says dont bring them well you will say naw I will find someone else to play with.

So again I guess wait out a couple months and see what happens or move on or buy more stuff.

The frustrating thing is that until this edition, SoB were still a very playable army. What kept them scarse was the cost of buying the models. GW has stated in the past that they will not get ride of SoB, but that does not mean they won't ignore them either. Things like unbound and super heavys have made most TAC lists null and void. You have to bring a super or a way to deal with one. SoB lack both.

And yes if people have the right to field models if they bought them, but if you spend $400 on ripetides, I feel it says something about you as a player that you felt like to needed that many in one game in the first place.

That's only if your area plays that way and besides SOB can still ally Knights. Like most Imperial armies have to.

pm713 wrote:

 Salted Diamond wrote:

OgreChubbs wrote:
Same way all whfb player dealt with it. Cry become depressed, sell of all models but the ones you like the most and wait a couple months to see what changed.

SoB are basically gone and a thing of the past.

People got new and very pricey models and like to use them. If you spent 400$ on riptides then someone says dont bring them well you will say naw I will find someone else to play with.

So again I guess wait out a couple months and see what happens or move on or buy more stuff.

The frustrating thing is that until this edition, SoB were still a very playable army. What kept them scarse was the cost of buying the models. GW has stated in the past that they will not get ride of SoB, but that does not mean they won't ignore them either. Things like unbound and super heavys have made most TAC lists null and void. You have to bring a super or a way to deal with one. SoB lack both.

And yes if people have the right to field models if they bought them, but if you spend $400 on ripetides, I feel it says something about you as a player that you felt like to needed that many in one game in the first place.

That's only if your area plays that way and besides SOB can still ally Knights. Like most Imperial armies have to.

But it would then be 1 Knight vs 3 ripetides. What do you think they would kill first. Then it would be 3 tides vs me. I can deal with playing vs 1, but when people refuse to do anything less then 3.... The response to a list should not be "play a differet army". If it was simply a matter of changing my list, fine. Bad list would be my fault. I can tailor to have a figthing chance vs WS spam, and with many SM lists I can at least make them fight for their win, but when people are only willing to play the power lists, it takes the friendly out of the LGS.

 Salted Diamond wrote:

pm713 wrote:

 Salted Diamond wrote:

OgreChubbs wrote:
Same way all whfb player dealt with it. Cry become depressed, sell of all models but the ones you like the most and wait a couple months to see what changed.

SoB are basically gone and a thing of the past.

People got new and very pricey models and like to use them. If you spent 400$ on riptides then someone says dont bring them well you will say naw I will find someone else to play with.

So again I guess wait out a couple months and see what happens or move on or buy more stuff.

The frustrating thing is that until this edition, SoB were still a very playable army. What kept them scarse was the cost of buying the models. GW has stated in the past that they will not get ride of SoB, but that does not mean they won't ignore them either. Things like unbound and super heavys have made most TAC lists null and void. You have to bring a super or a way to deal with one. SoB lack both.

And yes if people have the right to field models if they bought them, but if you spend $400 on ripetides, I feel it says something about you as a player that you felt like to needed that many in one game in the first place.

That's only if your area plays that way and besides SOB can still ally Knights. Like most Imperial armies have to.

But it would then be 1 Knight vs 3 ripetides. What do you think they would kill first. Then it would be 3 tides vs me. I can deal with playing vs 1, but when people refuse to do anything less then 3.... The response to a list should not be "play a differet army". If it was simply a matter of changing my list, fine. Bad list would be my fault. I can tailor to have a figthing chance vs WS spam, and with many SM lists I can at least make them fight for their win, but when people are only willing to play the power lists, it takes the friendly out of the LGS.

That just makes the SOB like the other Imperial factions though.

pm713 wrote:

 Salted Diamond wrote:

pm713 wrote:

 Salted Diamond wrote:

OgreChubbs wrote:
Same way all whfb player dealt with it. Cry become depressed, sell of all models but the ones you like the most and wait a couple months to see what changed.

SoB are basically gone and a thing of the past.

People got new and very pricey models and like to use them. If you spent 400$ on riptides then someone says dont bring them well you will say naw I will find someone else to play with.

So again I guess wait out a couple months and see what happens or move on or buy more stuff.

The frustrating thing is that until this edition, SoB were still a very playable army. What kept them scarse was the cost of buying the models. GW has stated in the past that they will not get ride of SoB, but that does not mean they won't ignore them either. Things like unbound and super heavys have made most TAC lists null and void. You have to bring a super or a way to deal with one. SoB lack both.

And yes if people have the right to field models if they bought them, but if you spend $400 on ripetides, I feel it says something about you as a player that you felt like to needed that many in one game in the first place.

That's only if your area plays that way and besides SOB can still ally Knights. Like most Imperial armies have to.

But it would then be 1 Knight vs 3 ripetides. What do you think they would kill first. Then it would be 3 tides vs me. I can deal with playing vs 1, but when people refuse to do anything less then 3.... The response to a list should not be "play a differet army". If it was simply a matter of changing my list, fine. Bad list would be my fault. I can tailor to have a figthing chance vs WS spam, and with many SM lists I can at least make them fight for their win, but when people are only willing to play the power lists, it takes the friendly out of the LGS.

That just makes the SOB like the other Imperial factions though.

Other armies can change their lists. But if you have to build to counter the power lists, it takes IMO much of the fun part of the game away.


The point of this thread was not meant to be poor me, my SoB are not playable. They are. But when the only place to play that is not 2+ hours away is a uber power meta, not at all friendly pick up games, it takes away the desire to play. And I would dearly love to get back into the game, but I want to play for fun. Not to see how much I can break the game and how hard I can stomp the other players face, which my local meta is.

This edition is a power-gamer's game. That isn't good or bad per se, it's just the nature of the beast at present.

You either embrace that, find like-minded people to play differently or...

I just stopped playing.

I COULD join the arms race (I have plenty of disposable income), but it doesn't interest me in the slightest.

My allotted hobby time is now spent working on a DIY Zone Mortalis table/terrain set just because it's fun to build and it keeps me connected on some level to the hobby aspects of warhammer that I enjoy.

In the future if the game returns to a form that seems more enjoyable I might return. IF it doesn't? Whatever...

I can't say for the FLGS part as I've never played in them. I play with my friends at my place. I introduced each of them the same way. I invited them to my house, setup the table and prepared 2 lists. one with space marines and one with orks and told them to chose one. We would then proceed to play a game as I explain the rules.

Like drugs, each time I hooked up a player and my FLGS was more than happy for the revenues :-)

So I can only say, build up a second army if you only have one and try to drag in friends or family to try a game with you and, who knows, you might get new players in the hobby.

Also, these days I play a little bit less and I scratch my itch by painting way more than before. So now I have a full space marine list painted and I'm quite happy about that achievement. You might try this out as well if you have partially painted lists. I find it very satisfying.

Don't be like me who just snagged a new in box Admech army on ebay because they missed the game so much :(

But yeah, best thing to do is maybe get a couple small forces going and see if you can get friends to at least try it. Or if there's a scene around already, see if you can borrow an army once in a while just to play a game or two?

I say play a game that attracts less strokers.

 Salted Diamond wrote:
I play SoB, so I have no counter to many of these power lists.

You do have accounted, you just choose not to. There is options, you are just not using them. So saying there is no counter, is wrong. You are choosing not to play another army. You are choosing not to ally. Not saying they are good ides, but saying you have no counter i just false. Part of the problem can be you. I mean yes it sucks not having much options for Sisters of Battle. thing is, GW preaches or use to preach the concept of "counts as". So use another codex and use the rules that you thing are Sisters of Battle like and use them as "counts as". Yes you are allying but at least you are attempting to make them fluffy and have fun with it. Whey you get lemons, make lemonade. Don't want to do that, you are part of the problem as well. Don't just blame others, or saying there is no other options. There is choices, you are choosing not to use them.

But when there is little chance for even a semi fun game, why bother.....

I am in the same boat as you. I don't want to buy another army. I want to use the army I want. So I had no fun with them Dark Angels and Tyranids in 5th edition. I don't want to ally in 6th edition when I tried Tyranids. I fully understand where you are coming from. I really do.

QUESTION
How do other people cope when they're LGS is not a fun place to play? If you know there is little to no chance for anything other then a stomping, how do you not give up on the game?

I basically quit. I don't mind loosing, hell I haven't won a game of 40K yet. But loosing and not having fun and just playing in futility? I just quit. I don't bother gaming anymore. Just recently a new Friendly Local Gaming Store opened up and people are gaming. Lucky for me people are playing for fun. So I am getting games in now.

But to answer your question, I quit playing, because 6th came out and it seemed everyone quit at the time. Thing is I didn't stop collecting. As long as part of the hobby for you is collecting and modelling and painting, you can still do that. Yes it sucks not getting any gaming in. Thing is, if gaming is a big part of the hobby for you, and you can't find any games in your area, you are just stuck with the other aspects of the hobby. Is that enough for you? If not, maybe time to take a break, and come back in a few months or year to see if people's attitudes change.

I can't believe how grown men need to win with plastic toy soldiers. So you have two choices. Look else were to play. If you can't like I think you are saying, then you either accept their attitude, or you don't. So quit playing for now, but keep continuing with the other parts of the hobby. If not nothing wrong in taking a break for a while and come back later. Pretty sad people will not play for fun with plastic toy soldiers.

I'd try to start a community. Maybe try and get some new buddies into it or do your best to try and change the meta up a bit. Path to glory campaign, narrative campaign, try and convince people you can still have fun with your toy soldiers when you don't win. Is the entire club triple-riptide like people? If you can get even a couple fluffy players you could probably change their minds with some work. And don't worry about those TFG's, was it really worth buying 3 'tides?

 paqman wrote:


Also, these days I play a little bit less and I scratch my itch by painting way more than before. So now I have a full space marine list painted and I'm quite happy about that achievement. You might try this out as well if you have partially painted lists.

THIS.

I've been playing since 2nd edition. The game ebbs and flows in terms of balance, enjoyability and overall player mindset.

When an edition or a new codex has made an army I play less fun I have just taken a break entirely from the game or switched my focus to painting/terrain making like paqman suggests.

GW changes its editions, codexes and approach to the game like most of us change our underwear. It helps to not become too attached to any particular army or game features, because its only a matter of time before your codex, rulebook and sometimes even whole army are tossed aside for the new and shiny.

Also there are plenty of other gaming options out there. Maybe take this as a chance to dive into a completely new game. A clean slate with no baggage or expectations can be a very refreshing gaming experience...

Yeah, I agree that 7th Edition lends itself to max-min obsessed power gamers. It's very difficult to find a casual game where I live.

I coped by finding other games that scratch that gaming itch. I still paint GW models, but consider their games to be almost unplayable. AoS is near impossible to balance given the lack of points. 40k is just a power gamer's wet dream/nightmare composed of spammable power units, near invincible death stars and massive power divides between Factions and even between units within Factions. If you're not willing to be a slave to the meta, you're not going to enjoy gaming in even a moderately competitive environment. Sisters of Battle (as well as many other Factions right now) have no real place in a competitive environment.

I mostly play board games at this point. Lots of Descent and Imperial Assault. A buddy is trying to talk me into Warmachine/Hordes, but I'm so committed to 40k. I think the last actual game of 40k I played to completion was in early 2015.

Really, I cope by accepting that 7th edition just isn't fun at all and hoping that 8th edition will eliminate 99% of the nonsense added in 8th. The game needs to be fully rebalanced and simplified. $1500 for a full rule set (every book with rules in it) is ridiculous.

Painting/modding was always a big part of the hobby for me, and for a few months it was enough to keep me going, but as I completed squads and tanks, I felt like it was a waste. I was painting these models to never use them. I'd check in at the LGS once a month hopeing to find someone to plan a friendly game with.

I have switched over to X-wing and Armada at a 2nd local store that does not have any 40K. I still do a lot of painting and some modding, but I still makes me miss the pleasuse of finishing a squad or special model and putting it down on the table. Speical like I have a SoB equivilant Sgt that once killed an Avatar of Kain in CC (lots of lucky rolls). I painted her sword to look like the molten metal apperaence an Avatar has. Gives charater and a fun story.

I'm hopeing that if/when 8th come out it will help address the power creep, but GW's track record makes me think it will prob just make it worse.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Davor wrote:

 Salted Diamond wrote:
I play SoB, so I have no counter to many of these power lists.

You do have accounted, you just choose not to. There is options, you are just not using them. So saying there is no counter, is wrong. You are choosing not to play another army. You are choosing not to ally. Not saying they are good ides, but saying you have no counter i just false. Part of the problem can be you. I mean yes it sucks not having much options for Sisters of Battle. thing is, GW preaches or use to preach the concept of "counts as". So use another codex and use the rules that you thing are Sisters of Battle like and use them as "counts as". Yes you are allying but at least you are attempting to make them fluffy and have fun with it. Whey you get lemons, make lemonade. Don't want to do that, you are part of the problem as well. Don't just blame others, or saying there is no other options. There is choices, you are choosing not to use them.

I do some ally as you said. I have a squad of old arbites that I use as scout to bring SM into my army. But to counter the power lists it would be more play a differnt army and ally SoB into it. If I wanted to do that, I'd just play the other army. Even if I used my SoB models to count as SM, I'd loose what makes SoB differnt and why I like plaything them. Acts of Faith, Shield of Faith special rule, etc...

And even this would not solve the issuse of then I'd have to play the power creep lists to have a chance.

Davor wrote:

But when there is little chance for even a semi fun game, why bother.....

I am in the same boat as you. I don't want to buy another army. I want to use the army I want. So I had no fun with them Dark Angels and Tyranids in 5th edition. I don't want to ally in 6th edition when I tried Tyranids. I fully understand where you are coming from. I really do.

Nice to know I'm not the only one.

 Fenrir Kitsune wrote:
I say play a game that attracts less strokers.

Such as?

It sucks the guys at your LGS won't tone it down. I'm in a similar boat, so I really only play with about 8+ people I know are decent and I've more or less given up on the store tournies, as it's all tournament armies.

I either A) play only with friends at the store or B) bought two $40 3' x 6' tables and play at home with friends.

I'd say that's your best route, try and start a Facebook group, find some like-minded guys, get two tables, and have some fun home games. Hope your situation improves.

In my local gaming club people seem to take and hour to move etc. and rarely get past the 1st turn. Both my friends don't play 40k at the moment. The nearest store is 2 hours away and I seldom get a chance to go there, I really just play in tournaments as of know. It's a bummer alright.

Host armies at your own place. I maintain multiple armies specifically so that other people don't feel obligated to drop money just to play with me (although if they want more customization out of the armies, then they'll need to drop money).

That or just come on here and yell at people.

Yeah my local group died for me just after 7th launched. I wasn't enjoying the game anymore due to the over complicated mess that the rules had became.
However just recently I thought sod it it's been a while so I had a game. Haven't played again since.
It was the realization that GW will never fix the game that made my mind up to get rid of some armies also. I've gone from 9 3k+ forces to 3 1.5k forces and I'm still considering getting rid of more.

Wish it wasn't so but alas

If my FLGS wasn't a fun place for me I wouldn't be doing this hobby.

I'm happy to put a bunch of models on the table and play with what I brought while my group usually does Optimised Stealth Cadre at 750, 2 Flyers at 750, etc etc.

My friends want to do a tournament in the summer. I'm doing everything in my power to not go, despite pressure from my group to attend. I only really get enjoyment from playing one guy and that's the person that brought me into the hobby. But even he is starting to power game now, with my last recollection being two Dreadknights at 750. I know a few others that play fluffy but we don't talk much outside the hobby.

It's disgusting. The worst of it is when people I know either knowingly cheat or misread what they can do. You're already playing power armies against my BA/DE/Orks, do you really need to cheat your way to a win?

Come to think of it, only one person seems to do this in my group. Everyone else is quite chill. The group just revolves around this one guy though and trying to beat him.

I've got a small Infinity group starting up. Having more fun with them, although I don't get to play much due to geographical location.

Since I missed 6th ed playing Fantasy (then it died) I returned to the hot mess 7th ed is and just can't bring myself to play it beyond the few games I did.
It sucks. I've not gotten to play 40k beyond a couple of games since the end of 5th, and its a shame since I once greatly enjoyed it.

Look into facebook gaming groups around your area - put out a feeler. I guarantee there are some garage gamers who would play more narrative/campaign/casual games.

Does the store have a white-board or a notice board where you can post up some info on the kind of gaming you're looking for?

7th has turned me off completely from joining back into the "current" 40K environment. I'm locating opponents via Oldhammer forums and facebook groups.

I know this may not help but what me and a fiend did was pretty fun. We where in a 2v2 game every other week or so, and kept lossing like badly.

We said lets have more points per game and a bigger table. They agreed we knew they each had 3 super heavies for their avergae 2-3k games.

So we used the table to abuse them badly. I have a weird obsession with siege warfare, like really weird. So I took nearly every baslisk and manticore I owned and set at the very end of the table and shot away. While my friend took alot of forts and blockers.

The plan was simple super heavies due bad vs terrian and cost alot. If you can lag them down with alot of mass objects like scenery plus they are tall be a nazi with shooting from the gun to the model it reduces their range quite a bit.

When the system is abusing you, abuse it back.

Swamps dangerious terrian needing to measure from the barrel to the model they are shoing at the Y axis. Trying to stop as many rerolls as yoi can lol. God I wish there was a model called jinx that let you cancel atleast 2 rerolls a phase.

Not sure how viable it is for SoB but my mate used alot of flying orks with the rocket back pack to lock with them every turn after they got to close. Most people try to get the best shooting heavies they can, so they can be bogged down with bodies.

The closest game store near me I know of is over 2 hours away, and even then its just a really tiny little store with only 2 tables. I typically only play with two of my friends or occasionally make a 2.5 hour trip, to cincinnati to find people to play with. It's rough, I know your pain.

I've stopped playing because the town I move to has no English speaking gaming clubs. Sure I could go to the local GW, but people would rather speak German (of course, it's their native language).

I don't have enough time to stand around GW like an idiot waiting for a game, so I just stick to painting and modelling. When I visit my family, or go to see collaborators back in the UK I sometimes take my models with me and hit up my old FLGs though.